Some years ago I saw the very successful play Six Degrees of Separation, by John Guare. The concept of the title is that no matter how lowly or how important you are in the world you can be linked with anyone in six degrees (or moves) or less.
Recently I went to look around the Frank Sinatra house in Palm Springs. It was a most interesting assignment and these six degrees came to mind. I will be posting some other reflections on the visit which was for my weekly column, but while I was waiting outside the house to meet my contact I thought about my link to the original owner, long since dead in 1998.
He had a very stormy relationship, and an even more difficult marriage to Ava Gardner. Some say he never totally recovered. But when it ended in 1954, Ava went for some rest and relaxation to a mutual friend Ernest Hemingway. It was he who introduced her to Spain's most famous bullfighter, Luis Miguel Dominguin.
Gardner fell deeply in love with the man, although later she said: "It was a sort of madness, honey."
Now here's where the links begin. In the mid-seventies we decided to spread our company to Spain and in order to do that we had to have an English-speaking agent, who could find us a partner. And that's when we met and did business with one, Pedro Rodriguez Mombru. He had for many years been the business manager of the aforementioned Dominguin. So Mombru - Dominguin - Gardner - Sinatra. Check mate in four moves!
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